The drive to Ellsworth is now better than ever, thanks in part to the nearly complete roadwork in the Green Lake/Goose Pond area and to the fact that leaf peepers and tourists have pretty much gone home.

Last Friday my wife and I continued a trend we started a few years ago of shopping in the area on Veterans Day.

This year’s trip was uneventful compared to last year’s when we decided to take our daughter’s car, which had been sitting idle in the yard while she was at college. Thumping and thrashing in the front end eventually wound up costing us four tires, a tie rod end or two, two rear springs, and an alignment.

It was an expensive trip, but good in a way in that our daughter was going to take the car to school and would have had all sorts of trouble with repairs out of state, to say nothing of the safety factor of her driving it to Rhode Island.

You might sympathize with me when I say I had a bit of apprehension as we started this year’s mini-trek in our aging Saturn. As it turned out there was nothing to worry about.

We hit L.L. Bean and that outlet’s outlet, Monroe Salt Works, Reny’s, and Marden’s before calling it quits. I managed to find a couple of bargains – paltry compared to my wife’s trove, and infinitesimal compared to this paper’s Shop Girl. Then again, I’m not one to be all that spontaneous in the shopping department. And I’m not yet in the Christmas mode, but my wife is. She tends to think ahead. Some of the family is gathering for Thanksgiving and the occasion is good for early gift deliveries – saves on the shipping costs and anxiety over whether items will arrive intact and on time.

All that shopping Friday and some yard work Saturday morning gave me restless foot syndrome – I needed to get out and see some real estate first hand. My wife suggested we head out to Bangor City Forest and the Orono Bog Boardwalk. It sounded good to me – close to home, away from the crowds, plenty of fresh air – and cold, too.

We headed out Stillwater Avenue past Hogan Road (1.6 miles) and took Tripp Drive to the parking area (there is an entrance off Kitteridge Road, too). The gate for vehicles at Kitteridge Road opens at 7 a.m. and closes at sunset (although the city has been known to close it as much as an hour before sunset, the city’s Web site says). I didn’t expect to find the Tripp Road lot full at mid-afternoon, but it was. No crowd problem, though, because the 650 acres of forest with 13 miles of trails as well as the mile or so of bog walk can swallow up a lot of people.

As a matter of fact, we saw only a half-dozen people on the boardwalk.

If you haven’t had the chance to walk this gem, by all means take the time and do it, but do so soon. From now through Thanksgiving weekend, it will be open 8 a.m.-4 p.m. and you’ll need to begin your walk no later than 45 minutes before closing time. Should there be prolonged snow cover, the 2005 season will end early.

The walk is self-guided and there are seven “stations” along the way that have narrative and pictorial displays explaining what you can see from that location. For example Station 4 is at a wooded shrub heath — low shrubs with scattered dwarfed spruces and tamaracks, while a bit farther along at Station 5 you’re looking at a mosaic of moss lawns and wooded shrub heath hummocks.

And while it’s fall and there isn’t new growth, there are still a great many things to see. I love the tall cotton grass with its white puffball sitting atop slender stalks some 18 inches above the ground. They look like big snowflakes dancing over the heath in a gentle breeze. Lichen in its bluish-gray tint stands out from the greenery around it, and pitcher plants, mostly toppled, still hold their watery cargo.

By the way, the boardwalk is wheelchair-friendly. There are benches for rest and/or contemplation every 200 feet or so.

New this year are two structures at the start of the board walk.

One is a log restroom. The other, according to the official Web site, is a small log cabin for “storage of maintenance tools and supplies, education and registration materials, first aid supplies, and an emergency cell phone. A screened porch on the cabin provides shelter for the docents, educational attendants who volunteer to staff the boardwalk during periods of heavy visitor use. Most materials for the cabin were donated by Northeastern Log Homes, and for the outhouse by Northern Log Homes. Both these much-needed structures were built entirely by volunteers.”

If you are interested in volunteering or helping out financially, check out the Web site at www.oronobogwalk.org. Each of the eight-foot sections of the walk can be “sponsored” (many already are). Donations may be sent to the Orono Bog Boardwalk Endowment, University of Maine Foundation, 2 Alumni Place, Orono 04469.

To complete our outing, we opted to take a walk in the City Forest. The bog walk is off the forest’s East Trail, so we decided to follow it to the northern end where it meets the West Trail and the Main Road (which dissects the forest). There are distance markers every 500 feet to help you keep track of your progress, and at trail intersections a map is posted so you don’t have to be afraid of embarking on a hike without a map.

When we reached the northern end we decided to use the Main Road to take us back to Tripp Drive and then back to the parking lot. The moon smiled down on us and the sun was bidding adieu with a blaze of glory when we got back to the car. I figured we’d walked more than four miles.

MITA partners with KCT

Maine Island Trail Association has joined with the Kennebunkport Conservation Trust to manage visitor use and promote Leave No Trace ethics on the Cape Porpoise Islands.

The islands frequently are visited by local residents, according to MITA’s Dave Mention, trail director.

“We want people to be able to visit them,” said Tom Bradbury, executive director of the Kennebunkport Conservation Trust. “But it’s also important that we educate visitors so that they leave the islands in the same or better shape than they found them. This is exactly what MITA does, and they do it very well.”

“We’ve worked hard to develop conservation partnerships,” Mention said.

MITA manages 43 state islands as part of a 10-year management plan and agreement with the State of Maine Bureau of Parks and Lands. MITA acts as steward to another 68-plus privately owned islands on the trail and also administers a program to educate the public about Leave No Trace principles. Including mainland sites, MITA is acting steward to more than 150 different sites. For 2006 there will be more than 13 new islands on the trail, Mention said.

Boaters are welcome to visit KCT islands for day use such as fishing, swimming, picnicking, and walking the beaches. Day use islands include Stage, Goat (which is home to Goat Island Light), Redin’s, Green, Milk, Savin Bush, and Bass. Camping is allowed on Vaughn, Trott’s, and Cape islands with a permit, which is available from the police station in Kennebunkport.

Topping the priority list is posting new MITA signs on these islands to increase the effort to get visitors to carry off all trash, Mention said. There is also a plan to sell “wag bags,” a system for safely disposing of human waste. That has been an ongoing problem on the islands, he added.

With the addition of these 10 islands, the trail now extends from Kennebunkport to the Canadian side of Passamaquoddy Bay. The Kennebunkport islands will now become part of the annual fall and spring cleanups MITA conducts and provide more places for visitors to explore.

For more information on MITA, contact Mention at 58 Fore Street, Building 30, Portland 04101, e-mail him at Trail@mita.org or visit MITA’s Web site at http://www.mita.org.

Bradbury can be reached at P.O. Box 7028, Cape Porpoise 04014, or via e-mail at tbradbury@thekennebunkportconservationtrust.org. The Trust’s Web site is: www.thekennebunkportconservationtrust.org

“Touching the Void”

Maybe you’ve seen this movie on television. Here’s your chance to see the 106 minutes uninterrupted by commercials. It’s offered by the Epic Sports duo of Rod Wiley and Dave Vavro.

Directed by Kevin Macdonald and written by Joe Simpson, it is the true story of one man’s miraculous survival. Simpson and Simon Yates set out in 1985 to climb the unconquered west face of the Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes. After successfully summiting, disaster struck when Simpson fell and broke several bones in his leg. The two decided to attempt a descent together with Yates lowering Simpson 300 feet at a time by rope.

Yates unwittingly lowered Simpson into a crevasse and after a while was no longer able to hold onto the rope. His choice was to cut the rope or be pulled to his death. He cut the rope. The astounding tale of Simpson’s survival from that fall and his crawl to safety is bound to keep you riveted to the screen.

The film will be shown at Bangor Public Library at 6 p.m., Nov. 30, on the second floor in the Lecture Hall. For more information, call Willey or Vavro at Epic Sports at 941-5670.

Mountaineering classes

Acadia Mountain Guides Climbing School at Alpenglow in Orono is offering a few classes for mountaineers in the coming weeks.

Introduction to Mountaineering is scheduled for Dec. 3-4.

This course is based on Mount Washington, N.H., and takes you off the trail and above tree line to a world of steep slopes, snow, and exposure. This course teaches basic mountaineering skills required to travel in more exposed mountainous terrain with minimal equipment. Route selection, clothing and dress, difficult navigation using altimeters, compass, and maps, use of crampons and ice axe, avalanche transceiver use, and fundamental rope skills will be taught.

Avalanche Awareness and Rescue, Level 1 will be taught Dec. 17-18 at Mount Washington.

This introductory course will help you to understand safe winter travel. Snowboarders, skiers, snowmobilers, snowshoers, and mountaineers will learn the basics of avalanche hazard formation through the relationships of terrain, snowpack, weather, and people.

Ecuador Volcanoes: Glacier School and Mountaineering will be taught Dec. 29-Jan. 9.

The journey begins in the capital city of Quito, located in the heart of the Andes Mountains of South America. It will involve climbing a few lower summits followed by an ascent of the Volcano Cotopaxi, the highest active volcano in the world (19,350 feet) and located within one of Ecuador’s showpiece national parks.

For more information, contact Acadia Mountain Guides Climbing School at 866-7562 and ask for Libby Wilder or call Jon Tierney’s cell phone at 461-4338 or check out their Web site at http://alpenglowgear.com or www.acadiamountainguides.com

Jeff Strout’s column on outdoor recreation is published each Saturday. He can be reached at 990-8202 or by e-mail at jstrout@bangordailynews.net.